There is a shortage of qualified and skilled health professionals providing cost-effective maternal, newborn, and child health (MNCH) services in Cross River State, Nigeria. Frontline health workers (FLHWs) have the potential to learn new skills as part of a task-shifting and sharing (TSS) policy. This brief highlights the results of the TSS policy in Cross River state: village health workers identify and refer pregnant women in their communities to antenatal clinics and provide oral medications; community health workers perform initial case management and ensure quick referrals to secondary facilities for specialized care; nurses and midwives deliver MNCH interventions that are accessible and affordable to all; only medical officers can repair cervical lacerations, manage pre-eclampsia and eclampsia, and continue management of newborn complications. The brief offers recommendations so that governments can achieve adequate and timely access to high-quality health care through appropriate MNCH interventions, as well as enhancing the abilities of FLHWs to improve MNCH care services through TSS
